FullReads

THE WIFE.I said: God! What beauty!

PROF.Aha!

THE WIFE.[Looking at him] Do you know that I have to repeat everything to you nowadays?

PROF.What?

THE WIFE.That I have to repeat—-

PROF.Yes; I heard. I’m sorry. I get absorbed.

THE WIFE.In all but me.

PROF.[Startled] My dear, your song was helping me like anything to get the mood. This paper is the very deuce–to balance between the historical and the natural.

THE WIFE.Who wants the natural?

PROF.[Grumbling] Umm! Wish I thought that! Modern taste! History may go hang; they’re all for tuppence-coloured sentiment nowadays.

THE WIFE.[As if to herself] Is the Spring sentiment?

PROF.I beg your pardon, my dear; I didn’t catch.

WIFE.[As if against her will–urged by some pent-up force] Beauty, beauty!

PROF.That’s what I’m, trying to say here. The Orpheus legend symbolizes to this day the call of Beauty! [He takes up his pen, while she continues to stare out at the moonlight. Yawning] Dash it! I get so sleepy; I wish you’d tell them to make the after-dinner coffee twice as strong.

WIFE.I will.

PROF.How does this strike you? [Conning] “Many Renaissance pictures, especially those of Botticelli, Francesca and Piero di Cosimo were inspired by such legends as that of Orpheus, and we owe a tiny gem–like Raphael ‘Apollo and Marsyas’ to the same Pagan inspiration.”

WIFE.We owe it more than that–rebellion against the dry-as-dust.

PROF.Quite. I might develop that: “We owe it our revolt against the academic; or our disgust at ‘big business,’ and all the grossness of commercial success. We owe—-“. [His voice peters out.]

WIFE.It–love.

PROF.[Abstracted] Eh!

WIFE.I said: We owe it love.

PROF.[Rather startled] Possibly. But–er [With a dry smile] I mustn’t say that here–hardly!

WIFE.[To herself and the moonlight] Orpheus with his lute!

PROF.Most people think a lute is a sort of flute. [Yawning heavily] My dear, if you’re not going to sing again, d’you mind sitting down? I want to concentrate.

WIFE.I’m going out.

PROF.Mind the dew!

WIFE.The Christian virtues and the dew.

PROF.[With a little dry laugh] Not bad! Not bad! The Christian virtues and the dew. [His hand takes up his pen, his face droops over his paper, while his wife looks at him with a very strange face] “How far we can trace the modern resurgence against the Christian virtues to the symbolic figures of Orpheus, Pan, Apollo, and Bacchus might be difficult to estimate, but—-“

[During those words his WIFE has passed through the window into the moonlight, and her voice rises, singing as she goes: “Orpheus with his lute, with his lute made trees . . .”]

PROF.[Suddenly aware of something] She’ll get her throat bad. [He is silent as the voice swells in the distance] Sounds queer at night-H’m! [He is silent–Yawning. The voice dies away. Suddenly his head nods; he fights his drowsiness; writes a word or two, nods again, and in twenty seconds is asleep.]

[The Stage is darkened by a black-out. FRUST’s voice is heard speaking.]

FRUST.What’s that girl’s name?

VANE.Vanessa Hellgrove.

FRUST.Aha!

[The Stage is lighted up again. Moonlight bright on the orchard; the room in darkness where the PROFESSOR’S figure is just visible sleeping in the chair, and screwed a little more round towards the window. From behind the mossy boulder a faun-like figure uncurls itself and peeps over with ears standing up and elbows leaning on the stone, playing a rustic pipe; and there are seen two rabbits and a fox sitting up and listening. A shiver of wind passes, blowing petals from the apple-trees.]